Holiday Challenge 2023 Organized by Jack Clarner at Jay Peak

Mission success!! Here’s a recap of our epic day, and some pictures to accompany it.

Yesterday, we woke to early alarms, piled in Mom’s minivan, and headed north to Jay Peak. We clocked in at 6:50 am for our first lap. I was accompanied by Gray Flanagan (an alpine skier at St. Mikes who just won an Eastern Cup on Saturday and who has joined me for the last two years of this event), Carl Kellogg (who raced for the Middlebury nordic ski team and joined Gray and I for our first event), Josh Valentine (who also raced for the Middlebury nordic ski team and was a crucial addition to the crew), and Caleb Duggan (who manages J-skis in Burlington and jumped at the idea of joining us as soon as he caught wind).

Here’s the lap-by-lap recap:

Lap 1 was a blast. We caught sunrise around three-quarters of the way up and soaked in the early rays. In typical Jay fashion, shelter from the wind was nowhere to be found, which made for an efficient transition, and we were on our way back down in no time. We had a great time cruising around on a couple inches of powder up top and then got to work testing the strength of our pin bindings on the fresh groomers below.

Lap 2 was a bit slower. 600 ft from the top of the tram, we found a newly placed “closed” sign, which made summiting significantly more of a challenge. After chatting with ski patrol (and because we’d mentally committed to 6 laps) we decided to set 10,000 vertical feet as our revised goal.

For lap 3 we decided to check out the southernmost peak and made it there unscathed despite the runaway skier that careened into Caleb and left him with a tweaked knee. Luckily, Caleb bounced right back, and we mobbed down the lift line in high spirits.

On lap 4 we reached our mental and physical low. After spending most of the lap in silence, we shared our pain and reflected on Moriah’s incredible ability to withstand it. After some discussion, we agreed the pain cave that Mo often spoke about must be around the corner, and that we were still in the “pain lounge”. With Moriah in our thoughts and a smile on our faces, we charged forward.

On lap 5, our hip flexors stopped working as we would have liked, so we tested new techniques for swinging our feet up the hill with awkward torso undulations. We knew the rest of the Clarner clan was coming for the final ascent, and the finish line was in sight.

For lap 6 we met Luke, Millie, and my parents at the bottom, crushed a couple of cookies, and let their fresh legs set the pace. At this point, Carl and I were crawling up the mountain, and it wasn’t until the final push that we sucked it up and hung with the pack.

With more than 10,000 feet of elevation, almost 21 miles, and 9.5 hours under our belts, we exchanged big hugs, snapped a team picture, and were ushered off the mountain by the patrollers doing their final sweep in the last light.

It was an amazing day, with an amazing group of people, and on behalf of our crew, and the Moriah Wilson Foundation, thank you so much for your support. Happy holidays!

Sincerely, Jack